Game of Death II was Golden Harvest's second attempt to cash in on Bruce Lee's name, but this sequel tries to do its own thing...eventually.
The first half of the film is pretty disrespectful. Footage of Bruce Lee is clumsily shoehorned in simply to get his name in the credits but it's so badly done that it's cringeworthy. For a start, the footage is clearly from Enter The Dragon, and it looks like they didn't even bother to match the film type as you can tell it's from totally different stocks when it cuts between the archive footage and the real film. They didn't even bother to get the make up and the outfit colour to match for the scenes with the Abbot. Add to the fact that Kim Tai-chung doubles for Bruce Lee PLUS plays his brother is totally obvious. They shoot Kim from behind most of the time in a really obvious way, but on a few occasions you see a full front shot of his face and can tell it's not Bruce.
All this is doubly sad because this is actually an incredible kung-fu film! The fight choreography by Yuen Woo Ping and Sammo Hung is superb, and if you disregard the Bruce Lee cash in it's actually a decent story as well (for this type of film) Having no less than three directors is a plus point and all are known names. Ng See Yuen and Corey Yuen later went on to make the martial arts triumph 'No Retreat No Surrender' and of course Sammo hung is a legend in the kung fu world.
I'm actually surprised that Raymond Chow, who was supposedly a family friend of the Lees, allowed such a foul cash grab to be made. Fair enough, the first Game Of Death had an excuse as they were finishing his work (even though they changed everything), but this really was a cheap effort to make money off the dead.
Regardless, if you can stomach the first half -hour of the film and it's really shameless flogging of Bruce Lee footage, then you are in for a treat!
The last hour is where it dumps the use of Bruce footage and becomes it's own film - and it's a damn good one too! The end fight is one of the very best in kung-fu history and that's saying something.
Kim Tai-Chung is a solid action star, and he can handle comedy too. He could have genuinely been the new face of Golden Harvest had they given him more projects of his own. However, he made only two more (non GH) films before retiring, and Jackie Chan become the new main star of Golden Harvest productions in the early 1980s.
If this film had been it's own thing then it would certainly be a classic, but most people won't watch past the first 30 minutes of shameless Brucesploitation to get to the good stuff.
